Free Republic

What had been obvious “to the rest of us” for years, is finally official: late last night, shares of Warner Bros. Discovery, the parent of CNN and TNT, crashed 10% to the lowest level on record after it reported dire results, which missed across the board and plunged across every income statement category… … but the biggest hit – and surprise – was the company’s stunning $9.1 billion charge taken to write down the value of its traditional TV networks, such as CNN and TNT, which were acquired in 2022 when Warner Bros Discovery was created as part of its...

On Tuesday, Axios announced that it would be laying off around 50 employees. This equates to roughly 10 percent of the news company’s staff. In a memo sent to employees, obtained by The Washington Post’s Katie Robertson, Axios CEO Jim VandeHei said the company was making "some difficult changes to adapt fast to a rapidly changing media landscape." We’re eliminating around 50 positions to get ahead of tectonic shifts in the media, technology and reader needs/habits. This is a painful but necessary move to tighten our strategic focus and shift investment to our core growth areas," he wrote. He said...

Sky News abruptly cuts its live feed as a mob of migrants surround its reporter

A thief in São Paulo, Brazil gets hit by a bus after snatching a phone from an elderly man

The Apprentice left the Cannes Film Festival empty-handed, with no announcement of a U.S. distribution deal following former President Donald Trump’s threat of a lawsuit and cease-and-desist demand against the filmmakers. In addition, the movie failed to win any prizes at Saturday’s closing ceremony, despite some movie pundits predicting that actor Sebastian Stan would be rewarded for his portrayal of Trump.While a buyer could materialize in the weeks ahead, the road to U.S. distribution looks uncertain as streamers and specialty theatrical labels would have to weigh the possibility of a messy and protracted legal fight. Box-office prospects also appear dim,...

Neil Young has grudgingly returned his catalog to Spotify. He removed his music in 2022 in protest against the streaming service’s exclusive Joe Rogan podcast, accusing the production of spreading “misinformation.” In a new post on his website, Young made no bones about his dislike of Spotify, but explained his move was a reaction to Rogan’s show becoming available on other platforms too. “Spotify, the number one streamer of low-res music in the world – Spotify, where you get less quality than we made – will now be home of my music again,” he wrote. “My decision comes as music...

Producer Rob Reiner’s anti-Christian smear, God & Country: The Rise of Christian Nationalism, limped out of theaters after grossing a hilarious $60,464 worldwide. That’s fewer than 7,000 tickets sold, even after producer Rob Reiner got all kinds of free media from countless corporate media outlets.

Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg said the last thing she expected when arriving at the polls this morning was to have trouble voting. After heading into Love Park Community Center, she was told by those working that she had already cast her ballot during the early voting period. According to Ogg, after roughly 30 minutes, she asked those with Harris County Clerk Teneshia Hudspeth's office to call Hudspeth. She added that nothing sounded correct and questioned who could’ve voted on her behalf. Ogg was notified by Hudspeth that Ogg’s partner, Olivia Jordan, a fellow attorney, had cast a ballot...

Nike is laying off 2% of its corporate workforce as it contends with weaker consumer spending. 'The actions that we’re taking put us in the position to right-size our organization to get after our biggest growth opportunities as interest in sport, health and wellness have never been stronger," Nike said in a statement to FOX Business. Starting Friday, more than 1,600 positions will be cut as the company tries to increase its investment in high-priority areas such as running, women's clothing and its Jordan brand, CEO John Donahoe told employees, according to a memo seen by The Wall Street Journal.

The Los Angeles Times, the largest newspaper in California and one of the biggest by circulation in the entire United States, was hit with a heavy round of layoffs Tuesday. The move to terminate more than 110 positions within the company has been widely rumored for several weeks — even prompting a one-day walkout protest from the newsroom last week — but the scale of the layoffs, and when those layoffs would happen, was not widely known until Tuesday morning.

Two Chicago journalists reported that Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson has become so "stressed out" that he was hospitalized for panic attacks. John Kass and Anita Padilla broke the news on WGN-AM's Chicago Way Podcast on January 16, saying that Johnson needed medical help due to increasing stress. They were talking about the illegal immigrant problem on air when Kass said "No amount of anti-depressants can cure him of this problem." "I know, it's so true," Padilla said. "And you know, I actually, you brought it up, I was gonna bring it up." "The panic attacks?" Kass asked. "The mayor's panic...

Is The Washington Post in full-scale collapse? A recent look at the numbers provides a fairly convincing answer to that question. According to the report, not only is the Post losing $100 million a year, but it lost over half of its online engagement by the end of 2023. The signs were already there by mid-year, and the worst has come to pass. See: The Washington Post Is Facing a Financial Buzzsaw“Of that audience, less than one in five read more than a single article per month, while less than one in 500 actually convert to a paying subscription.”— Josh...

New York City Mayor Eric Adams said on Monday that Washington D.C. "has abandoned us" in regards to the ongoing migrant crisis the city and other parts of the country are facing - days after he announced stinging budget cuts to education and policing due to the crisis. "D.C. has abandoned us, and they need to be paying their cost to this national problem," Adams said during a town hall in Brooklyn, according to Politico. The "sanctuary" city has seen over 130,000 migrants come into the city since last year, a relatively small number of which have been bussed in...

A group of pro-Palestine activists staged a protest at the global investment management corporation BlackRock’s headquarters in Manhattan on Thursday. The protesters carried banners and entered the lobby of BlackRock’s offices, chanting slogans calling for the company to cease its support for what they view as genocide profiteering and to free Palestine. The demonstration is part of a larger global movement of pro-Palestine protests that have been taking place in recent months. These protests were sparked by an outbreak of violence in the occupied territories that resulted in the loss of many Palestinian lives. From Washington, D.C., to London and...

WASHINGTON — Police say a sitting member of Congress was carjacked Monday night in Southeast D.C. At 9:30 p.m., the Metropolitan Police Department confirmed there was an armed carjacking that occurred at the intersection of K Street and New Jersey Avenue, SE. Investigators say a white Honda CHR with Texas tags RYL-2900 was stolen from a member of Congress. Police say to be on the lookout for three men wearing black all alleged to be involved in the carjacking. WUSA9 has confirmed that the carjacking victim was Representative Henry Cuellar (D-TX). His office says he was not injured and is...

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Gov. Mike DeWine tested positive for COVID-19 on Tuesday. According to a release from the governor's office, DeWine was experiencing mild cold symptoms on Monday. DeWine believed it was just a head cold, so he continued his work day on Tuesday but his symptoms worsened. His doctor advised he take a COVID test, which came back positive. The governor reportedly had a 101-degree fever at the time of taking the test around 5:30 p.m. He is resting at home at this time, according to the release. DeWine's positive test comes just hours after he and Columbus Mayor...

ESPN and other Disney-owned channels have gone dark on Charter's Spectrum cable service, as the two companies intensify their dispute over fees. Disney pulled ESPN, ABC and its other cable channels off Spectrum on Thursday night, the eve of college football's first big games and the middle of US Open tennis coverage. Spectrum serves huge markets including New York and Los Angeles and has some 32 million customers, many of whom are now fuming at the loss of sports coverage. At the moment Disney pulled the plug, ESPN was carrying a college football game between Florida and No. 14 Utah...

Target's quarterly sales declined for the first time in six years, with one company executive blaming the drop on the "strong reaction" to its Pride merchandise. Target faced a backlash against its LGBTQ+ merchandise earlier this year, with some conservative shoppers vowing to boycott the store. The retailer's sales at stores open at the same time a year ago declined 5.4% in the second quarter, the company said on Wednesday. On a conference call to discuss the results, executives, including CEO Brian Cornell, primarily blamed wider economic issues for the drop, such as pinched consumers who are cutting back on...

Concerns are growing in Washington, D.C. about some major grocery stores being able to keep their doors open due to shoplifting. During a news conference Friday, D.C. Councilman Trayon White said he spoke to the regional management of a popular Giant Food store on Alabama Avenue Southeast. “We had the opportunity to meet with some of the leadership of this Giant,” White said. “Some of the regional leadership at this Giant, what we heard was disheartening. We learned that this Giant has lost over $500,000 in product loss, which is about 20% of the sales. We know it's tough times...

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez joined the SAG-AFTRA and Writers Guild of America picket lines in New York City on Monday, encouraging workers to keep fighting and taking aim at executives such as Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav and their “insatiable greed.” “While this is a fight against AI, more than AI, this is a fight against greed,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “How many private jets does David Zaslav need? For real. How many private jets do the CEOs need? It is insatiable. It is unacceptable. I do not know how any person can say, ‘I need another $100 million before another person...